


i’ll never make it alone

by imperialstark



Series: oh! darling [2]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Awkwardness, Bonding, Flirting, Fluff, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Insomnia, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Pining, Pre-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Pre-Relationship, Prequel, Steve Rogers Has PTSD, Teasing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-19
Updated: 2020-06-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:13:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24675928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imperialstark/pseuds/imperialstark
Summary: Tony held his glass in front of him. “Toast?”“What are we toasting?”“To sleepless nights,” Tony said, sounding perhaps more serious than Steve had ever heard him. “And the things that keep us up.”As Tony looked at him with those dark eyes of his, his glass aloft, he realized this wasn’t Tony Stark, CEO. Tony Stark, son of a legend. Not even Tony Stark, Avenger. This was Tony Stark without a mask.“To sleepless nights,” Steve echoed.***Or the one where Steve and Tony bond over a sleepless night.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Series: oh! darling [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1784122
Comments: 7
Kudos: 69





	i’ll never make it alone

**Author's Note:**

> So this takes place before the events of oh! darling, although you don’t necessarily have to read that fic to read this one. This is just meant to be a little interlude between part one and part three of oh! darling. Friendly reminder that I don’t own Marvel or anything related to it and this all just for fun.

The tower was too quiet. Steve never thought he’d miss the roar of train cars passing through Brooklyn or hearing the daily hustle and bustle of the city. New York had been the city that never slept, even in Steve’s day. 

Sleeping through the war had been easier than sleeping in the tower, he decided, staring up at the stark white ceiling from the comfort of his bed. Trains to tanks. Hustle and bustle to screams and moans. The war had taught him to fear the quiet moments. There had been no respites or breaks for them, and if things were going too well, it was only going to go to shit later. It had been a fact of life then, and Steve believed in it now. 

Goosebumps sprouted like weeds on his arms as the air conditioning kicked on. He tried to ignore it, he really did, but ever since coming out of the ice, he had a hard time staying warm. Steve wasn’t anemic by any means, and yet, even the slightest breeze could set him off. 

“Hey, JARVIS?” he asked, the words sounding clumsy in his mouth. 

“Yes, Captain Rogers?” came a smooth, distinctly British voice, which, according to Tony, was not in the ceiling. 

“Could you turn the air off in my room? Please?”

The AI sounded puzzled. “Are you sure, sir? It’s quite warm out.” 

“Please,” Steve repeated. His stomach twisted into a knot. What if JARVIS said no? How would he be able to explain anything to a being who had never known real life and the anguish that came with it?

“...As you wish, sir.”

The air went off with one swift whoosh. 

Steve inhaled and closed his eyes. A super-soldier could survive off of less sleep than the average human, but that didn’t mean he liked being sleep-deprived. But the air had already worked its magic. When Steve closed his eyes, all he saw was black water glinting like glass in the sun; An icy abyss calling his name. Cold crept into his lungs, frost coated his skin, and there was that familiar burn only ice could give you, engulfing his blood—

His eyes shot open. The beat of his heart echoed in his ears, sounding too close and too loud. Sleep was going to be a long way off. Throwing his blankets back, Steve sat up and sighed. 

“Just one night,” he said to no one in particular. “I just want one night.”

“If you’d like, Captain,” JARVIS said, startling Steve. He didn’t know that the AI could speak unprompted. “Sir is currently in the communal kitchen if you want company.” 

“Sir?” His brows furrowed. “Stark?” His panic momentarily forgotten, Steve slid out of bed completely, not really sure where he was going. A session in the gym with one of Stark’s super-soldier grade punching bags sounded swell, but if Stark was in the kitchen, maybe it wouldn’t hurt to seek him out and talk about...something. 

He and the tower’s resident genius were on their way to becoming friends. Maybe. Possibly. They were close to becoming whatever came before friends. Most of Steve’s friends hadn’t insulted him and offered him a place to sleep free of charge in the same breath. But Tony Stark was a genius; maybe being eccentric was a requirement. 

“What’s he doing up at—“Steve glanced at the clock, “two in the morning?” 

“Sir believes that sleep, and I quote, is ‘for the weak.’” 

Steve snorted, his mouth turning into an unwitting smile. Eccentric, indeed. 

Mind made up, Steve made his way to the kitchen, a blanket wrapped securely around his shoulders. The air was still going full blast outside of his room. Steve gritted his teeth and pulled the blanket tighter around him. “ _I’m never running out of shields_ ,” he thought.

The elevator ride to the communal kitchen was over all too quickly, and Steve was greeted to the sight of Tony fluttering from counter to counter. Oddly enough, Tony didn’t look out of place in the kitchen, despite having heard many, many horror stories of his past attempts at cooking. 

“Hey, Tony,” Steve said in greeting, hovering on the edge of the threshold. 

Tony paused mid-flurry and gave him the smallest of smiles. There was something fragile about it that had the edge of broken glass. 

“Hey, Steve,” Tony said, nodding at him. “Nice blanket.”

The blanket had been a gag gift, courtesy of Natasha, of course, of Steve in his full USO regalia. 

“ _I had it custom made_ ,” she had said with a smirk, which for Natasha, might as well have been her beaming with pride.

“Thanks,” Steve said, and the conversation died just as soon as it had begun.

Tony started to fidget in place, the silence growing unbearable. Despite living together for three months now, awkwardness still clouded their interactions outside of the battlefield. 

“Um,” Steve began. “What are you doing up?” 

A shadow passed over Tony’s face, but as quickly as it had appeared, Tony broke out into a grin, and it was gone. “Innovation doesn’t have a curfew, Rogers. Don’t tell me a sketch has never kept you up?”

Steve blinked. “You know that I draw?”

“Of course I do,” Tony said, resuming his motions around the kitchen. “You leave your sketchbooks all over the tower.” 

His cheeks burned. “Sorry,” he said. “Didn’t mean to inconvenience you.” 

“Please, you? Inconvenience me? You’re talking to the king of inconveniences. Besides,” Tony shrugged as he measured out a few tablespoons of what looked like fresh ground coffee. “You’re good.” 

“Thanks,” he said. He was getting all kinds of compliments tonight. “I was in art school before…”

“Everything,” Tony finished.

“Everything,” Steve agreed. 

A silence fell over them again. Tony dumped the coffee grounds into a silver Moka pot and set it on the stove.

“You know why I’m up,” Tony said, leaning back against the counter. “But what about you? What’s keeping you awake?” 

Steve weighed his options. He could tell Tony the truth, tell him that his brain was fucked, tell him how he couldn’t stand the cold without picturing himself plunging to his death.

Or, he could lie. 

“It’s too quiet,” he blurted out. “The tower,” he gestured around them. “It’s...quiet.” That was close enough to the truth, at least. 

Tony, thankfully, didn’t laugh at him. “I thought soundproofing the walls would be a good idea. Don’t know too many people who enjoy city life for the noise.” 

“I grew up by the tracks,” Steve found himself saying. “It wasn’t the best neighborhood, but it was one of the only places that would rent out to the Irish.” 

That was one of the strangest parts of the future. In Steve’s time, the Irish, along with the Italians and the Jewish had been second-class citizens. A step of above people of color, in the eyes of bigots, but only just. All of them had been an afterthought in the collective consciousness of WASP America. 

“I knew that,” Tony said, his voice going low. The Moka pot bubbled away on the stovetop, the rich smell of coffee, hitting Steve’s nose. 

“You seem to know an awful lot about me,” Steve said. 

“Your buddy, Howard, thought tales about his old war pals were appropriate bedtime stories for a child.” 

Steve frowned. A bitter note had seeped into their conversation that always occurred whenever Howard was brought up in Tony’s presence. Steve may have known the man during the war, but that didn’t mean he was the same man who Tony had called “Father”. During the war, Howard had always been loud. Flashy. The most conspicuous person in the room. 

“ _That man wouldn’t know the meaning of subtlety if it whacked him over the head with a frying pan_ ,” he remembered Peggy saying, her crimson lips pursed in distaste as Howard chatted up an SSR secretary.

“Why a frying pan?” Steve had mused. 

“ _They’re sturdy, for one_ ,” she had said, matter-of-factly. “ _And quite hard to miss_.” 

Steve remembered the secretary had slapped Howard upside his head after one too many risqué remarks. In hindsight, Peggy was right, not that Steve ever doubted her. A frying pan would have been just as, if not more, sufficient.

That man had apparently settled down and raised a child who was staring at him with something dark and dangerous pooling in his eyes. Steve would have to tread carefully. 

“As smart as he was, he didn’t have much sense, did he?” he said with all the caution of someone approaching a stray animal.

Tony’s posture lost some of its rigidity. “No. He didn’t.”

Silence again. If someone asked him, he couldn’t tell them why, but at that moment, Steve wanted to hear what Tony had to say. About anything. About everything. 

“Stop lurking in the shadows like a creep,” Tony said. “Unless you’re trying to do a Fury impersonation, then by all means continue. You’re missing the eyepatch, though.”

Steve huffed, but even he couldn’t hide his amusement. The thought of Fury sitting in the dark with a fuzzy blanket draped over him instead of his usual leather duster made for a decidedly less intimidating picture. And if Tony was joking around, then the danger of mentioning Howard had passed. Steve entered the kitchen completely and took a seat at the island right across from where Tony stood. 

“You’re drinking coffee at two in the morning?” he said, arching a brow as Tony took the now whistling Moka pot off the burner. 

“Not coffee,” Tony corrected. “Marocchino,” he said, placing a can of cocoa powder onto the counter. 

“Still has caffeine,” Steve said, mainly because Tony was so easy to rile up. 

“‘Still has caffeine’,” Tony mocked, his voice going up a pitch. “That’s what you sound like. Don’t you chastise me, Rogers.”

Steve chuckled, raising his hands in surrender. “My apologies,” he said. “Must be an important project.”

“All of my projects are important,” Tony said. He pulled a glass out from under the island, paused as if he were pondering something, then pulled out a second glass. 

Steve drank in every sure movement of Tony’s as he dusted both glasses in cocoa powder, and carefully poured the steaming espresso and milk into each cup. He sprinkled more cocoa over the top of each glass with a flourish before pushing one towards Steve. 

“Drink up, Cap.”

Steve gingerly grabbed the cup and blew at the steam. 

Tony held his glass in front of him. “Toast?”

“What are we toasting?” 

“To sleepless nights,” Tony said, sounding perhaps more serious than Steve had ever heard him. “And the things that keep us up.” 

As Tony looked at him with those dark eyes of his, his glass aloft, he realized this wasn’t Tony Stark, CEO. Tony Stark, son of a legend. Not even Tony Stark, Avenger. This was Tony Stark without a mask.

“To sleepless nights,” Steve echoed. Their glasses met with the lightest of clinks. Steve’s fingers brushed against Tony’s as he pulled his drink away. It was nothing, really. Barely a glance. And yet a light jolt zipped through his fingertips and left him feeling unsettled. 

If Tony had also been shocked, he made no mention of it, instead downing his espresso with gusto. Steve watched the bob of Tony’s throat, feeling hot beneath the collar. The coffee was already getting to him, and he hadn’t even taken a sip yet. 

Steve took his espresso like a shot. The coffee surged through him, driving away the cold that had settled into his bones. The cocoa was sweet and creamy on his tongue. Of course, Tony wouldn’t waste money on the cheap imitation stuff made with powdered milk. 

“Was it as good for you as it was for me?” Tony asked, his eyes twinkling. 

Steve burst out laughing, maybe the first genuine laugh he’d managed since coming out of the ice. At that moment, ice and the cold were the furthest things from his mind. 

“Even better,” he said, perhaps too earnestly, but that was between him and God. “I wouldn’t mind a refill.” 

Tony’s answering smile was blinding. His eyes were all crinkled in the corners, the way they did whenever Tony was truly happy. Not that Steve spent a lot of time memorizing Tony’s smiles. 

The tension from earlier had (hopefully) disappeared for good. 

“ _He should always smile like that_ ,” Steve thought. Tony’s smile could drive a blizzard away. 

They sat there for the rest of the night until the sun crept over the horizon, flooding the kitchen with light and something warm and golden had curled in Steve’s chest.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all for reading. You know the drill! Comments, kudos, and bookmarks aren’t necessary but they’re much appreciated. Follow my [tumblr](https://imperialstark.tumblr.com) for more stony/marvel related content!


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